Their Arrival
by redhaze03
Summary: When the Golden Ship docks on the asteroid and no one disembarks, Karkat decides to look for the missing Harelybert twins himself. He's waited for them long enough. (written pre-new session arrival)


Hello there! Long time no see! I lost my email and password for this website for the longest time, can you believe it? But I have recovered them both now, so I intend to upload some works I've done since the last time I signed on here. To be honest, I've been struggling with my writing muse a lot, but I managed to squeeze some works now. All of it Homestuck... oops.

Please enjoy!

The golden ship had landed on their asteroid about twenty minutes ago, signifying the end to a long period of sorely felt separation between friends. And while it was true that the occupants on one vessel of inter-spatial transportation had never met the occupants of the other, with exception for brief moments between the humans that ended up in the death of the Derse dreamers, the separation had been felt as severely as the loss of a close loved one. It probably wouldn't have been so bad if they had been able to at least pester one another online. As it was, Karkat felt himself to be the one most suffered from it all. Out of all the humans it had been the bespectacled dorks siblings that the short-fused troll had befriended. The ones that he could probably stand to spend time with without being forced or tricked into it. And of course they had not been the ones he got to spend about a sweep and a half. Of course he could never be that fortunate. Instead he had been left almost literally alone for three years.

… No one had come out of the ship yet.

Karkat felt the rage inside him, all but extinguished in the last hellish three years trapped him his worst romantic nightmare, suddenly spark back to life and quickly come over to a boil. Where the hell were they?! If this was one of Egbert's lame pranks, forcing everyone on the ship to keep you all waiting in suspense like desperate wigglers for their appearance, he had another thing coming. Karkat didn't care if he had to cut a hole into the hull of the ship in order to break in and find them, he would find them and then strangle that bespectacled nook chaffing idiot.

"Think they're trying to be fashionably late to their own welcome party or that they're just dead?"

It seemed like Karkat wasn't the only one bothered by the long wait, and the troll could only give Dave a look. Really? Really…? But he did make his point. They were not going to wait.

"I say we go find out," Karkat's voice was a throaty grumble, glaring fixedly on the spaceship. He missed the secretive smile on Rose, didn't pay attention as she whispered to Kanaya and Terezi. He paid no mind to the girls as Kanaya shared Rose's smile, and Terezi frowned uncertainly. He also missed the bare upward tug of a smirk on Strider's lips before he suddenly found himself being pulled up into the air, arms hooked under his own carrying him slowly up to the ship.

"FFFFF! Fuck! Strider what the fucking hell do you think you're doing?! Put me down you insufferable sack of piss, I'll smash your stupid idiot face in, see if I don't!"

"You really want me to let you down now man?"

Karkat could feel the smirk on Dave's words rather than see it on his face, the smug bastard. But they were several hundred feet up in the air at this point. He wouldn't put it past the ironically unironic douche bag to let him go here and now and let him plummet to his doom only to catch him by the ankle the last second, forcing his way into the hero's position when he should clearly be the villain in this scenario.

It was just like paradox space to put Karkat in terrible situations just to humiliate him and remind him of how awful his life and everything in it generally has been, is, and probably will be for as long as he lives. It was just his luck to be pinned with an asshole like Dave God Damn Strider and at his mercy. Of course, stick him with the one fuckstick that would ultimately make him look like a foolish grubsucking moron just because he didn't get to be god tier and fly and impress certain blind girls with all his shitty red that isn't even that great anyway, who even CARES, Strider's not so impressive, he's not impressive at all, he's a complete loser dweeb.

His ashen face was tinted red as he was set down on the deserted deck, immediately moving a decent five feet away and dusting off his clothes of any imaginary filth they had acquired while in Strider's hold. The guy was so insufferable; he could really hate him sometimes. A lot of the time… Nearly all the time, okay? But it wasn't like that. Karkat didn't feel black for Dave, he just hated him. Hated him with the all-consuming rage that… that until a few moments ago had been dampened by the crushing despair of his lost red quadrant he had almost fully given into until this point…

Huh… That sure was weird. The crushing feeling of despair was ebbing away with each passing moment. Just... suddenly... But perhaps think on that more later. Right now he had the Harleybert twins to find and give them a fucking piece of his mind.

The problem was… the ship was utterly massive… Bigger than the labs on the asteroid and, at the very least, equally complex.

Dave seemed to be thinking along the same lines as him, "I say we split up. You go underground, I'll check the upper decks and… those towers and spires that seem the very antithesis of aerodynamic. Holy fuck, no wonder it took them so long to catch up with us. Those things look like pure wind resistance!"

"There's no wind in space, ass munch." Karkat sighed irritably. This is what he had to put up with for 3 human years.

"You know what I mean, dick butt." Dave shot back.

"Clever," Karkat retorted dryly.

"What the fuck ever, just go get started already. I'm hoping the kitchens are in one of the upper decks and I'm not waiting any longer to find out."

"You just came here to raid their pantries, didn't you?"

"Fuck you. And so what if I did? Man I have lived three years off alchemizing variations of the snacks Rose and I had in our sylladexes as well as your shitty troll food which seems to consist 99% off of dead troll babies. I would cut off my left nut for a ham sandwich right now. And no, not a fucking grub loaf sandwich or whatever the shit. Good, old fashioned slices of honey roasted pig and cheese between two slabs of whole white bread. I don't care if it tastes synthesized as shit at this point. I will still eat the shit out of it and then ask for more."

"I honestly don't care. Just go, we'll meet up here if neither of us find them. I'm assuming Lalonde will inform us if we miss their grand exit while we raid their shit?" Karkat could feel the start of a headache threatening his temples

"Fuck, I don't know. But I'm assuming that's why she stayed behind. Probably knows something we don't. Like when doesn't she know something we don't? Except when she's plastered, maybe. I'm starting to think alcohol inhibits the use of our abilities. Like maybe I wouldn't be able to make time my bitch if I got piss ass drunk. Or I wouldn't be able to knight or whatever."

"Right, well… dismissed or whatever the fuck. Get out of my sight already, I can feel my eyes about to bleed from looking at you." Karkat waved him off, not even waiting for a reply as he found the closest door. So he definitely missed the middle finger salute Dave gave him before taking to the air again. He honestly wouldn't have cared either way… probably.

What followed was probably one of the most annoying, unfruitful searches on Karkat's life. And he had spent a year looking for Gamzee before he realized his shitty moirail was avoiding everyone, himself included, in the ventilation shafts. At least back then he had been able to find SOMETHING while he looked. All he found on this stupid fucking ship was room after empty room filled with absolutely nothing, not even a hint that John or Jade had even been in them.

Granted it was a large ship for just two people. Wow, they must have had the loneliest sweep and a half ever. At least Karkat had had his choice of shitty excuses of sentient beings to waste his time on. Jade and John had just had each other. If they got sick of each other who else did they have? But honestly, what were the odds that the two idiots would ever get tired of each other's company? They were practically the same person they were so much alike.

Okay, that was a lie. John was more easy going than Jade, more easily able to let stupid past mistakes go and laugh them off like they weren't a big deal. Jade was less likely to put up with inane shit, which seemed to be a thing John was full of. Thinking about it like that, how had they ever gotten along to begin with? It was like him and Gamzee, really.

Fuck, stop thinking about Gamzee right this second, you had better useless shit to occupy your time than your missing in action moirail. Sometimes you wondered if you could still even call him that. He hadn't been there for you once any of those times you had needed a feelings jam. Gamzee had never been all too good at calming you down, anyways. He'd make a piss poor attempt, though that much in and of itself would remind Karkat that he should listen to his moirail and calm down. Not that it really worked, but he'd make an effort, enough of one for both of them, apparently. Gamzee was too laid back to ever be really be able to calm down someone like him.

Jade had been so good at helping Karkat sort his mental word vomit... even if she looked less than pleased to do so sometimes. The troll had thought she would have made a good auspistice to his future and past selves, which were all his past selves at this point, really. But seeing as past, present, and future are all just tenses of the same self, in essence Jade had been good at leveling Karkat out and... and...

No, we're not going to think about that! Stop thinking about that right the fuck now, Karkat!

Come to think of it, hadn't there been another person with Jade and John? John's note had mentioned someone else... Oh right, that prototyped alternate of Dave. Man that must have been a laugh riot a second. Note how the words are literally dripping with sarcasm. So that was all there was to this giant ship. Jade, John, and a game construct of a douche bag. Paradise. What else could it have been? Look at this mess, there is sarcasm smeared all over the floor.

Karkat wondered idly if that had caused any sort of romantic entanglements. John and Jade were human siblings, tied to one another by the exact same genetic donors. It was a weird concept for trolls who all had their DNA mixed and matched within the mother grub, making it impossible to find any familial ties to anyone else, but to humans it seemed common place. Karkat had heard enough about it from Dave and Rose and why that meant they could never be in a concupiscent quadrant together.

The same would hold true to John and Jade, no doubt, and while Karkat had imagined a long and hellish trip for the siblings alone with no form of romantic escape during the most turbulent and hormone ridden years of their lives, adding a single possible suitor for either of them was probably worse. Sure, it would be easy enough to imagine and neat and tidy case quadrant vacillation between the three of them, the derp twins alternating red and black between the ghost-like douche lord, chances are it wasn't that easy. Especially since quadrants, let alone quadrant vacillation was not a thing with humans.

...

How long had he been searching now? Another twenty minutes? Half an hour? It felt like a lot longer. And not a single sign of life, much less specific life like Jade or John. Karkat was starting to wonder what the likely chances were of the ship finding its way to the asteroid and making a perfect landing completely unpiloted were. They obviously weren't that great, so logic would clearly dictate that someone landed this awful, golden eyesore on their dank and dreary little asteroid. So where the fuck were they?!

Karkat was about ready to flip a bitch, even though there was not a bitch to be found that he could flip.

Instead his mind wandered back to the odd thought of the possible romantic entanglements that could have gone on in this ship. Could sprites even be in romantic relationships? Would it have the same urges as the original human it had been? Would that stop any of them? Without quadrants or quadrant vacillation, any romantic indiscretion would be viewed as the ultimate offense, right? Of course many trolls saw quadrant vacillation in and of itself to be a pretty big offense, but Karkat still maintained that with careful planning and open minds, it could work in a beautiful symbiotic relationship.

But say that it was not the case, so we were talking about human's singular, linear version of romance. Boring as fuck, but still with its hardships. Probably.

Say that Jade entered a romantic entanglement with Davesprite, and while Karkat would assume Jade had better tastes than that, this was strictly hypothetical musings. So Jade and Davesprite, together in a human singular quadrant red relationship. Maybe a year, sure, let's be generous with this hypothetical relationship. A year together, and then maybe the king of the douches got bored, wanted something more, something different. Well pickings were slim, who else was there but Egbert? Okay, so he'd go behind Jade's back and red solicit John.

Okay, the image of Dave, any version of Dave, in a romantic relationship with John caused a strange twist in Karkat's gut that he wasn't ready for. Imagining them curled together, speaking quietly, smiling softly at one another, chaste little touches, then less than chaste, kisses shared between them, limbs tangling around each other, voices thick and breathy, John gasping Dave's name and... and he definitely wasn't prepared to analyze this at the current moment. It was... not entirely unpleasant, but not a good feeling, either. Nothing like the similar scenario he had with Dave and Terezi, not even close. It was... just weird. But he imagined that Jade wouldn't take well to the news at all. Back on Alternia such an indiscretion would result in inevitable violence, quite possibly the death of betrayer, their lover, or possibly both of them.

...

Thinking like that, the quiet of the ship became a bit more disconcerting. Yeah, that had been a purely hypothetical situation that Karkat had concocted, but how easy would it be to get rid of the bodies of two bucket minded quadrant scammers while you're travelling at near light speed through the space between spaces? A death like that would definitely be just, too. No one would blame Jade. At least none of the trolls would. Karkat still didn't fully understand the inner machinations of the human mind, try as Rose might.

Karkat's mind filled with bleak scenarios one after the other so fast when he heard it, the soft quivering notes of taught piano strings being tapped into a melody. The Knight of Blood felt his blood pusher speed up, startled, hopeful, and he followed the sound.

It led him all the way down to the end of the hall, a large golden door set into a golden wall left slightly ajar, allowing the music to filter out. Definitely the melodic tug of piano strings. The melody it created started slow, soft, and sweet, and a bit sad. It stopped Karkat short of slamming his way in. He could see blue sitting on the piano bench, long pale fingers sweeping over the ivory keys, drawing out this sweet tune that made Karkat's blood pusher ache.

The troll had never really considered himself a patron of the fine arts, maybe just cinematic ones, definitely not music, but this song, the way John drew the melody so naturally, made it look as easy as breathing… It did something to him. Karkat could close his eyes and let the music paint a picture in his mind.

The music picked up slowly, the soft little notes replaced with deeper ones, and just like that he was back on Alternia, disoriented for just a moment that such a soft, sad song could ever remind him of the savage world he grew up in. Nothing about Alternia was soft and sad like this, this song was it's very antithesis, really, and yet there Karkat was. Back in his hive, standing outside the balcony in his respite block, looking at the darkening purple and pink sky, the green moon coloring it oddly. Back to where he was a mutant freak living in hiding in a rust blooded village, waiting every day for the inevitable discovery of his blood color, the culling that would immediately follow it.

His breath caught in his throat, the sound hidden by the music. It wasn't Alternia the music reminded him of, but how he felt living there. The heaviness of living each day in fear and not being able to show that weakness to anyone. Of having to pretend to be strong instead, the feeling of loss and inevitability. And so much more than that, his failures in the game, the helpless feeling of not being able to save his friends. His time spent alone with his own thoughts in the asteroid. It was like John had made this song just with Karkat and his life in mind.

Eyes that had already begun to turn crimson with age fluttered open and it felt like a sudden punch to the gut all over again. He could clearly see John's profile from his spot by the barely opened door, and even though the human's eyes were closed, his expression was clear. This song was John's, not Karkat's, the carefully hidden, but not quite, expression of sadness the boy wore gnawed at his gut. He didn't think John was capable of making that sort of pained expression. He had always thought John was too much of an idiot to ever have to wear that sort of expression. But now Karkat felt like he was the real idiot for oversimplifying John at all. Hadn't he experienced loss? Hadn't he felt guilt and despair over his own failures?

John was like him, hiding his pain behind a mask, choosing to wear a smile instead of Karkat's scowl. That had to be even more painful, didn't it? Smiling through the pain… He didn't think he'd ever be able to pull something like that off.

The music picked up a little, disorienting Karkat with the sudden shift in mood. It seemed… almost happy now… almost. Maybe hopeful was a better word for it. John was smiling now, but now that Karkat looked, really looked, he could see the little chips in the mask, the little peaking views of sadness behind the smile that just made it all look so painful. Why?

Even now this sad song was trying it's best to be a cheerful little tune, but each sure strike of the key was starting to sound more and more forceful than happy, frustration bubbling under the loneliness. How was it possible to put so much emotion and then subtext on those emotions into the simple striking of fingers over piano keys? How did Karkat not realize that John was this complex underneath that bucktooth grin?

A wind instrument, one the troll couldn't identify, suddenly joined into the tune moments later, and Karkat realized for the first time that John was not alone in the room. Had Jade really been there all along? She was seated on top of the piano, her body angled away from John, making it near impossible for Karkat to see any of her face. He could make out the back of her new (not so new at this point, but still new to him) bark beast ears, the tip of her nose, and long delicate fingers protruding from the sleeves of her dark god tier witch dress, holding the wind instrument, digits dancing over it's length to produce different notes to accompany and enhance John's song.

It tempered the deep, forceful notes back to something softer, and Karkat felt the deep furrow of his brow relax to something more like surprise. It was so well timed, perfectly placed, and harmonious. It should have been obvious, really. Clearly a song composed as a duet, and yet... Karkat found himself shaken to his core again. It didn't feel planned or composed, it felt like Jade had stepped in just in time to sooth her moirail, which made Karkat's chest feel tight again. Moiraillegience was a quadrant that human siblings could safely share with one another, wasn't it?

And it made sense, all this time, just the two of them (+ the Strider) alone on a ship, they probably had plenty of feelings jams. Even if it wasn't a quadrant humans had, they were probably a text book example of moiraillegience at this point. These two idiots, who had no grasp on the concept of the pale quadrant and all the finer details it entailed, probably fit the diamond mold better than he and Gamzee ever did. The tight feeling became almost unbearable, it just wasn't fair.

John smiled, and it was directed right at Jade. Karkat could only assume that Jade would return it if her lips weren't occupied by the wind instrument. Who knows, maybe she was smiling anyways. It was... beautiful, it was what Karkat was, and what he wished he had all at once. God, how he had missed the two of them. What he would have given to be able to go back in time and find a way to travel with them instead. He bet he wouldn't have felt half as lonely. Even as perfectly as they fit together, Karkat knew that neither of them were the type to exclude him. If he had been lonely, if he had isolated himself, they would have looked for him, found him, found ways to make him feel better.

The piano picked up again, and with one final high note, the wind instrument faded away, leaving John to play again to his heart's content. And this time the Heir of Breath managed to make the deeper, harder notes actually sound hopeful, excited even, the frustration and loneliness ebbing away just like they had from Karkat the moment the golden ship had docked. John was excited to meet up with the others, too.

Would John be this excited to meet up with him?

The song ended with just a final little trickle or some emotion hard to explain... nervousness, maybe, but not agitation, still a little excited, perhaps. John was nervous to meet them, without words, without even having formally reached out to the bucktoothed idiot, Karkat could tell. all from the stroke of those long, elegant fingers along ivory keys.

Jade put a gentle looking hand on John's shoulder, and it drew a last few, melodic notes from the boy. What was that? Karkat could feel the answer on the tip of his mind. A stalling, a nervous stalling. John was stalling. And Jade was able to understand from those last few notes, too.

"It'll be alright, John. It'll be great, even! C'mon, let's go to the-" the Witch of Space stopped short, eyes goggling when she turned around and bright green eyes met up with gray speckled with red. "Karkat...?"

The troll sheepishly cleared his throat and John jumped out of his seat like he had been suddenly scalded.

"K-karkat?! W-what are you doing here?" Wide blue eyes stared at him, and their owner stepped forward and waved his hand in front of the troll like he expected him to disappear on him like an illusion. Oh for fuck's sake.

"What am I doing here? What am I doing here?! Oh you know, I just decided that it's been far too long and we just don't talk like we used to, so I decided to drop by for a little visit. What the grub sucking, taint chaffing fuck do you think I'm doing here?!"

John smiled bright. He smiled in the face of Karkat's verbal assault like he had just received an early birthday present.

"No, I mean, how did you get here? I mean I know we're due to arrive any second, but wow, did you fly off into the void in hopes that you'd see us a few hours earlier? That's really surprisingly sweet of you, Karkat! I didn't know you cared so much."

"Actually, John..." Jade piped in sheepishly before Karkat could answer again, "we arrived almost an hour ago now. I came looking for you and then... well you were nervously playing your piano, so I thought I'd let you calm yourself down first. The carapaces and consorts are already back on their respective planets, which are safely back in my sylladex now. It's just been you and me on the ship for a while now." She tucked back a few strands of hair that fell in front of her face, speaking to Karkat next, "I'm guessing you guys came looking for us when we didn't come out right away?"

"Oh wow, really? Oops!" John had the presence of mind to look sheepish as well, scratching the back of his head lightly.

Karkat let go of the innumerable questions about just how many game characters Jade had managed to bring along with them on their journey and just how she managed to do it. At least for now. Right now there were other things to worry about, like reaming these two idiots out for treating their reunion so fucking casually.

"You're goddamn right, 'oops!' Do you have any idea how long we were waiting out there for you idiots with nothing to show for it?! Do you just think we're made of time?"

"Aradia is!" Jade cut in with a giggle.

"Ha, fucking ha, like we all haven't heard that fucking joke a millions times over by now! It barely earned itself a fraction of a chuckle before, it's long since stopped being even remotely funny. The joke is dead, dead and rotting in the corner, attracting flies to lay their larvae into the decomposing flesh."

"Ew," John's nose wrinkled at the mental imagery, but he was still smiling, which set Karkat off even more. "Karkat that's gross. Jade's right, though. I just needed a bit of down time, calm myself down before I was ready to finally leave the ship. Almost a year ago I was really high strung and moody and it got to the point where no one wanted to deal with me. I have to admit I was pretty bad."

"The worst!" Jade nodded her agreement.

"Heh, thanks Jade. So one day Jade surprised me with this piano, she brought it right out of my house. And I realized that playing, composing music was really therapeutic I started writing this song like two days ago, even wrote up a part for Jade, and I wanted to get it just right before we arrived on the meteor. I wanted to play it for you guys, I guess I lost track of time completely. It happens, I guess," he shrugged. "It's not that big of a deal."

Karkat felt a tick right below his temple. "No, yeah. I can see how this would be no big deal to you guys. I mean we've only been separated three of your human years, racing against the clock and against Jack fucking Noir to this new session which is already slowly circling the grime covered drain of 'we're fucked.' By all means, sit back down, play another little ditty on your toy piano. Or hey, while we're wasting time, why don't we just take this baby back up and circle the outer ring for another three years? Think that'd be-! Oof!"

His rant would cut off mid-tirade by the sudden weight of a Harley crashing against his chest, pushing the air out of his lungs as she wrapped her arms around him tight.

"Oh Karkat! Shut your squid-diddling mouth already! We get it, we missed you too!" She brushed her lips against his cheek, then nuzzled it against it with her own cheek.

Karkat could feel the soothing touch of her hands smoothing slow circles on his back as if trying to comfort the rage in his belly after a nasty bout of word vomit. It made any and all further rants lodged in his throat disperse in all different directions, leaving him empty, but not bereft. It was... actually a nice feeling, and Karkat arms slowly rose to return the embrace, mumbling quietly. "I missed you, too."

And he had... so much. More than he ever let any of the others know.

But that new bit of information changed the whole scenario in Karkat's mind. John and Jade, no moirails, apparently despite that John had wrote Jade's flute to sooth his piano, that did not equate to their relationship outside of the music. It sounded more like Jade tried to help in whatever way she could, but in the end John was his own moirail, using the piano as a conduit. That was... more than a little pitiable. Hand John really been just as alone and lonely as Karkat had been this whole time? Isolating himself to his music instead of his thoughts?

"Aw, should I give you two a minute alone? Should I put a sock on the door?" John interrupted Karkat's thoughts with a cheeky grin, bringing the troll back to the matter at hand: his armful of Harley.

And just like that, the rage was back. "Egbert I-!"

"Shut your whore mouth, John!" Jade cut Karkat off again, and the Cancer could only blink owlishly for a second, especially at the way John cringed.

It let him see the chips in his mask again. John was still smiling, but it didn't look especially happy to Karkat anymore. It looked... strained... and lonely. Right... the song hadn't been an illusion. Everything he had seen then had been real. He wouldn't call John out on it, though. It'd make him a hypocrite He didn't want to shatter the human's delicate mask anymore than he wanted his own to be deteriorated over the years right before his eyes. He could see John in a way that the others didn't... couldn't... and he was such a pitiful fuck.

But John was a leader, just like Karkat was a leader, and their masks were what made people want to follow them despite their screw ups. Karkat understood. And as they stared each other down, Karkat realized that those blue eyes saw him just as well as he saw John. They looked right past his scowl to the vulnerable core within and and he offered him a smile of perfect understanding. He had never felt so raw, exposed and... relieved in his entire life. If he ever wanted anyone to see him for what he was and trust that they'd never say anything, it could only be John.

Karkat detangled himself from Harley's hold to regard the other boy.

"You're taller than I expected you to be, though not by much," he started, tone dry, both judgmental and dismissive.

John only smiled in answer, "You're less salty and sea weathered than I expected you to be!"

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?!"

"It means that from all our old pesterlogs I really expected to meet some old alien pirate with a dirty, hairy face, and a peg leg or something! You're actually kinda cute!" Was that a light coloring of red spreading over John's face?

Karkat could feel a light dusting of red spreading across his cheeks as well, and his instinctive reaction was to get loud. "That has to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard, and trust me that is saying something! I've lived the last three years of my live cohabiting the same space as Strider!"

That only increased the wattage in John's grin two fold and Karkat could almost cringe if he hadn't missed the sight of it so much.

"Oh that's right! Dave and Rose! And the other trolls, too! They're probably all waiting for us!"

"That's what I said from the start, you pan empty sack of hoof beast excrement!"

"Oh man! I can't wait to see them! I only saw Rose for a few moments about a year ago! I've missed them both like crazy!"

"Me too!" Jade chirped brightly, peeking over Karkat's shoulder, "C'mon John! We've kept them waiting long enough!"

Karkat looked between the two of them, starting to feel that left out feeling again. They were excited to see their human friends, of course. Once again he didn't find into the equation.

"I saw you once, too Egbert... two years ago. You got stabbed by a pre-scratch fish queen's trident, still saving the lives of everyone at the cost of your own, like the idiot that you are."

"You did? Oh man, I wish I had seen you guys, too! You can't believe how horrible it's been without all you guys!" John sighed heavily.

"Wow, excuse you! Forgive me if I'm not prime Egbert entertainment material!" Jade huffed, placing her hands on her hips.

"Aww, you know I don't mean it like that, Jade! And don't even pretend you don't know what I actually mean! You're pretty sick and tired of me, too at this point!"

"Heh, yeah, I know. I'm just pulling your leg. I'm tired as fuck of your ugly mug, too. In fact I'm about five minutes off from punching you right in the face if we don't get the hell off this ship now!" The witch giggled, talking about their mutual annoyance with each other like one would discuss a beautiful day.

"Not like you two didn't have your own idiot Strider to entertain you." Karkat added. He didn't expect the twin looks of taboo, partially hidden cringes and bitten lower lips. "What...?"

John shook his head, "It's a... really complicated story. I'd rather explain it later, with everyone around so we don't have to tell it over and over again."

Wow, the tone of his voice had gotten so heavy. Just what the hell had happened?

"And anyways, we have better things to think about right now! Let the welcome party you guys probably definitely planned for us! C'mon! Let's go!"

John changed the subject so quickly it left Karkat's head spinning for a moment in a mixture of aggravation to John's flighty nature, and pity for the almost hidden shift in his happy leader mask. So he was pretty caught off guard when Egbert grabbed a hold of his hand and started to tug him off quickly, stumbling a few steps before finding his balance.

"Son of a-! I'm perfectly capable of finding my own way back up to the deck of the ship you pus spittle bucket monger!" He did nothing to dislodge Egbert's hold on his hand, though.

"Hehe! Wow that sounded vaguely troll porn dirty! I think you've been hanging around Dave too long!" He also didn't argue or even mention when John's fingers interlaced with his own.

Speaking of Dave, "Oh right, Strider will be waiting for us on the deck of the ship."

"Aww! So you do care about Dave after all! That's so nice of you, Karkat! Making sure your friend isn't forgotten." John smiled genially.

Karkat felt himself bristle, "I don't-! I... I fucking hate that Strider!"

"Oh no! You can't hate Dave, Karkat! You're supposed to hate me, remember?" John pouted at him from over his shoulder.

"A-are...Are you making fun of me?!" Karkat screeched, red blossoming dark and faded on his gray skin.

"No! I mean it!"

Behind them Jade just giggled, muttering about idiot boyfriends as she followed at a more leisurely pace.


End file.
